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Do the Right Thing

1989 film directed by Spike Lee

Do the Right Thing is a 1989 film that tells a tale of bigotry and racial conflict in a multi-ethnic community in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, on the hottest day of the year.

Written and directed by Spike Lee.
It's the hottest day of the summer. You can do nothing, you can do something, or you can...

Da Mayor edit

  • Doctor, those that'll tell don't know, and those that know won't tell.

Radio Raheem edit

  • Let me tell you the story of right hand-left hand. It's a tale of good and evil. Hate: it was with this hand that Cain iced his brother. Love: these five fingers, they go straight to the soul of man. The right hand: the hand of love. The story of life is this: static. One hand is always fighting the other hand, and the left hand is kicking much ass. I mean, it looks like the right hand—Love—is finished. But hold on, stop the presses; the right hand is coming back. Yeah, he got the left hand on the ropes now, that's right. Ooh, it's a devastating right and Hate is hurt. He's down. Left-Hand Hate KO-ed by Love.

Tina edit

  • The last time I trusted you, Mookie, I ended up with a son.

Mister Senor Love Daddy edit

  • My people, my people, what can I say; say what I can. I saw it but didn't believe it; I didn't believe what I saw. Are we gonna live together? Together, are we gonna live?

Dialogue edit

Buggin' Out: Yo, Mookie.
Mookie: What?
Buggin' Out: Stay black.
Buggin' Out: You the man.
Mookie: No, you the man.
Buggin' Out: You the man.
Mookie: No, you the man.
Buggin' Out: No, I'm just a struggling black man trying to keep my dick hard in a cruel and harsh world.
Mookie: Pino, fuck you, fuck your fucking pizza, and fuck Frank Sinatra.
Pino: Yeah? Well, fuck you, too, and fuck Michael Jackson.
Da Mayor: Doctor.
Mookie: C'mon, what? What?
Da Mayor: Always do the right thing.
Mookie: That's it?
Da Mayor: That's it.
Mookie: I got it. I'm gone.
Buggin' Out: Hey, hey, Sal, how come you ain't got no brothers up on the wall here?
Sal: You want brothers up on the wall, get your own place. You can do what you want to do. You can put your brothers and uncles and nieces and nephews, step-fathers, step-mothers, whoever you want. See? But, this is *my* pizzeria. American Italians up on the wall.
Vito: Take it easy, Pop.
Pino: Don't start.
Buggin' Out: Yeah, that might be fine, Sal, but, you own this, rarely do I see any American Italians eatin' in here. All I see is Black folks. So since we spend much money here, we do have some say.
Sal: You lookin' for trouble? You a troublemaker, is that what you are? You makin' trouble?
Buggin' Out: Yeah! I'm a troublemaker. I'm makin' trouble.
Sal: You're a ball breaker. Always comin' in here lookin' for trouble, aren't you. Suppose I busted your head. How would you - Now, Mookie. Mookie, you wanna get your friend outta here.
Buggin' Out: Oh, you wanna kick me out now? You're gonna kick me out, huh?
Sal: Nah, I'm not kickin' you out. You're kickin' yourself out.
Buggin' Out: What? Look, we want some brothers up on the wall. Yo, Malcolm X, Nelson Mandela, you know, Michael Jordan. Tomorrow!
Pino: Daddy, you know, I've been thinking... maybe we should sell this place, get out while we're still ahead... and alive.
Sal: You really think you know what's best for us, Pino?
Pino: Maybe we can... can we sell this and open up a new one in our own neighborhood?
Sal: There's too many pizzerias already there.
Pino: Then maybe we could... we could try something different.
Sal: What am I gonna do? What am I - that's all I know. What am I doing? I been here twenty-five years. Where am I going?
Pino: I'm sick of niggers. It's like I come to work, it's Planet of the Apes. I don't like being around them. They're animals.
Sal: Why you got so much anger in you?
Pino: Why? I'll tell you why. My friends, they laugh at me. They laugh right in my face. They tell me, "Go to Bed-Stuy. Go feed the moulies".
Sal: Do your friends put money in your pocket, Pino? Food on your table? They pay your rent, a roof over your head? They're not your friends. If they were your friends they wouldn't laugh at you.
Pino: Pop, what can I say? I don't want to be here. They don't want us here. We should stay in our own neighborhood, stay in Bensonhurst, and the niggers should stay in theirs.
Sal: I never had no trouble with these people. I sat in this window. I watched these little kids get old. And I seen the old people get older. Yeah, sure, some of them don't like us, but most of them do. I mean, for Christ's sake, Pino, they grew up on my food. On my food. And I'm very proud of that. Oh, you may think It's funny, but I'm very proud of that. Look, what I'm trying to say, son, is, uh... Sal's Famous Pizzeria is here to stay. I'm sorry. I'm your father, and I love you, I'm sorry but... but that's the way it is.
Radio Raheem: Give me 20 "D" Energizers.
Sonny: 20 "C" Energizers?
Radio Raheem: Not "C", "D".
Sonny: "C" Energizers?
Radio Raheem: "D", motherfucker, "D". Learn to speak English first, all right?
Kim: How many you say?
Radio Raheem: 20, motherfucker, 20.
Sonny: Motherfuck you.
Radio Raheem: Motherfuck you? You, you all right, man.
ML: Well, gentlemen, the way I see it, if this hot weather continues, it's going to melt the polar caps and the whole wide world. And all the parts that ain't water already will surely be blooded.
Coconut Sid: You're a simple motherfucker. Now where you read that shit, eh? Polar caps...
ML: Don't worry about it. But when it happens, and I'm in my boat, and your black asses are drowning, don't call for me to throw you no rope, no lifesaver, or no nothing.
Sweet Dick Willie: You fool! You're 30 cents away from having a quarter! Where the fuck you gon' get a boat?
Mother-Sister: Hey, you old drunk! What did I tell you about drinking in front of my stoop? Move on. You're blocking my view. You are ugly enough. Don't stare at me. The Evil eye doesn't work on me.
Da Mayor: Mother-Sister, you've been talking about me for 18 years. What have I ever done to you?
Mother-Sister: You a drunk fool.
Da Mayor: Besides that. Da Mayor don't bother nobody and nobody bother Da Mayor but you. The man just tends to his own business. I love everybody. I even love you.
Mother-Sister: Hold your tongue. You don't have that much love.
Da Mayor: One day, you're gonna be nice to me. We may both be dead and buried, but you're gonna be nice; at least civil.
ML: Look at those Korean motherfuckers across the street. I betcha they haven't been a year off da motherfucking boat before they opened up their own place.
Coconut Sid: It's been about a year.
ML: A motherfucking year off the motherfucking boat and got a good business in our neighborhood occupying a building that had been boarded up for longer than I care to remember and I've been here a long time.
Sweet Dick Willie: It has been a long time.
Coconut Sid: How long?
ML: Too long! Too long. Now for the life of me, I haven't been able to figger this out. Either dem Koreans are geniuses or we Blacks are dumb.
Buggin' Out: You almost knocked me down, man. The word is "Excuse me".
Clifton: Ah, excuse me. I'm sorry.
Buggin' Out: Not only did ya knock me down, you stepped on my brand-new white Air Jordans I just bought, and that's all you can say is "Excuse me"?
Clifton: What, are you serious?
Buggin' Out: Yeah, I'm serious. I'll fuck you up quick two times.
Ahmad: Two times.
Buggin' Out: Who told you to step on my sneakers? Who told you to walk on my side of the block? Who told you to be in my neighborhood?
Clifton: I own this brownstone.
Buggin' Out: Who told you to buy a brownstone on my block, in my neighborhood, on my side of the street? Yo, what you wanna live in a black neighborhood for, anyway? Man, motherfuck gentrification.
Mookie: Pino, who's your favorite basketball player?
Pino: Magic Johnson.
Mookie: And who's your favorite movie star?
Pino: Eddie Murphy.
Mookie: And who's your favorite rock star?
[Pino doesn't respond]
Mookie: Prince. You're a Prince freak.
Pino: Boss. Bruce.
Mookie: Prince.
Pino: Bruce!
Mookie: Pino, all you ever talk about is nigger this and nigger that, and all your favorite people are so-called niggers.
Pino: It's different. Magic, Eddie, Prince... are not niggers. I mean, they're not black, I mean - Let me explain myself. They're - They're not really black. I mean, they're black, but they're not really black. They're more than black. It's different.
Mookie: It's different?
Pino: Yeah. To me, it's different.
Mookie: You dago, wop, guinea, garlic breath, pizza slinging, spaghetti bending, Vic Damone, Perry Como, Luciano Pavarotti, Sole Mio, non-singing motherfucker.
Pino: You gold teeth, gold chain wearing, fried chicken and biscuit eating, monkey, ape, baboon, big thigh, fast running, high jumping, spear chucking, three-hundred-sixty-degree basketball dunking, titsun, spade, mulignan. Take your fucking pizza piece and go the fuck back to Africa.
Stevie: You little slanty eyed, me-no-speaky-American, own-every-fruit-and-vegetable-stand-in-New-York, bullshit, Reverend Sun Myung Moon, Summer Olympic '88, Korean kickboxing son-of-a-bitch.
Officer Long: You Goya bean eating, fifteen-in-a-car, thirty-in-an-apartment, pointed shoes, red wearing, Menudo, mira-mira Puerto Rican cocksucker. Yeah, you!
Sonny: It's cheap! I got a good price for you, Mayor Koch, "How-I'm-doing?", chocolate egg cream drinking, bagel and lox, B'nai B'rith, Jew asshole.
Mister Señor Love Daddy: Yo! Hold up! Time out! Time out! Y'all take a chill! Ya need to cool that shit out! And that's the double truth, Ruth!
Sal: What'd I tell you about that noise?
Buggin' Out: What'd I tell you about them pictures?
Sal: What the fuck, are you deaf?
Buggin' Out: No! Are you? FUCK YOU! We want some black people on that motherfucking Wall of Fame now!
Mookie: We're trying to go fucking home! We've been here all fucking day, Buggin Out!
Sal: Turn that jungle music off! We ain't in Africa!
Buggin' Out: Why it got to be about jungle music? Why it got to be about Africa? It's about them fucking pictures!
Sal: It's about turning that shit off and getting the fuck out of my place!
Pino: RADIO RAHEEM!
Radio Raheem: Fuck you!
Sal: AND FUCK YOU TOO!
Ahmad: Get in there, Pino!
Radio Raheem: This is music. My music!
Sal: FUCK YOUR MUSIC!
Radio Raheem: Well, turn it off, then.
Vito: Hey, man, get the fuck out of here! We're fucking closed!
Buggin' Out: Fuck you! We're closing you guinea bastards for good! For good, motherfucker! Until you get some black people on that motherfucking Wall of Fame!
Sal: You're gonna fucking close me?
[Sal grabs his bat]
Buggin' Out: You're goddamn right!
Sal: YOU BLACK COCKSUCKER!! I'LL FUCKING TEAR YOUR FUCKING NIGGER ASS!
[Everbody in the pizzeria starts shouting at once at Sal's insult]
Punchy: [Over all the shouting] Oh, we're niggers now?! We niggers now!
Buggin' Out: YOU FUCKING WHITE TRASH! I'LL FUCK YOU UP!
Mookie: Sal, put the fucking bat down!
Buggin' Out: COME ON, MAN, YOU FUCKING GUINEA TRASH!
Sal: YOU BLACK COCKSUCKER!! YOU NIGGER MOTHERFUCKER!
[Sal explodes in rage and smashes Radio Raheem's boombox several times with his bat]
Mother-Sister: Good morning.
Da Mayor: Is it a good morning?
Mother-Sister: Yes, indeed. You almost got yourself killed last night.
Da Mayor: I've done that before. Where did you sleep?
Mother-Sister: I didn't.
Da Mayor: Hope the block is still standing.
Mother-Sister: We're still standing.

Cast edit

External links edit

 
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